Graphic novel round up

I like the main Fables series of graphic novels but I freakin' love this series featuring Jack:
In the main series characters tend to get lost or obscured due to having to have so many in the story. In this series that mainly features Jack, the stories are sooooo much more fleshed out and the writers are able to delve into the characters more without having to worry about whether one or another is getting enough page time or not. These are clever tales told well. The art and inking in them is also top notch. I'm devouring them like a fat kid devours chocolate dipped eclairs. Mmmmmmmmmm, chocolate dipped eclairs.

All too often you hear a ton of hype about a comic book series and more often than not the series never lives up to the hype. I'm happy to report this is not the case with Y: The Last Man. It's well written, well drawn, well inked, and well, I love it. This series tells the story of what happens when all the males of earth, human and other animal, get wiped off the planet. All except for one man and his monkey. It's chilling and thought provoking. It's got great compelling characters and lots of action and intrigue. I read the first in the series in one night and I practically ran back to my local library to check all the rest out so I could read them as quickly as possible. I'm almost through the second one and I'm looking forward to finishing the next three I've got checked out as soon as I can. I highly recommend this series.

Unlike the previous two graphic novels in this post Stitches is not part of a series, it's a stand alone true life tale of a young boy who grew up in Detroit with a cold distant money hungry mother, an aloof father, and a brother who left as soon as he could. Young David is shunted aside and he's ignored for reasons that are made clear only late in the book. He develops a tumor on his neck at a very young age and his folks decide not to tell him that it's cancer because they think he might not survive the operation, and when he does his life becomes even more bizarre than it already was.

This book touched me deeply. I identified it with it greatly, having grown up in a house with a cold money hungry dominant female figure, my crazy aunt, who used affection like a weapon. Even though our situations were very different, I felt like I knew just what Mr. Small went through in this book, having to deal with such powerfully crazy family members at such a young age, his maternal grandmother, a committed Christian, was a nut bag who should have been committed to a mental hospital early in life but somehow managed to avoid one until the day in her old age when she locked her husband in her house and tried to burn it down.

The art and choice of colors in this book are stunning. It's a muted palette Mr. Small uses and his story is also almost mute, for reasons you'll see if you read this book, so most of the book is a series of wordless panels that say more than words ever could. It's a story that is by turns sad, provocative, thought provoking, and mind blowing. I highly recommend it. I haven't read anything that touched me as deeply as this book did since I read Toast.

And once again I must give a shout out to my local library for stocking these and many other great graphic novels on it's shelves. Yay Johnson City Public Library!